before 900;Middle English,Old Englishende; cognate with Old Frisianenda,Middle Dutche(i)nde,Old Saxonendi,Old High Germananti,G Ende,Old Norseendi(r), Gothicandeis end < Germanic*anthjá-; akin to Sanskritánta- end

Related forms

ender, noun

Synonyms

4. tip, bound, limit, terminus. 5. End,close,conclusion,finish,outcome refer to the termination of something. End implies a natural termination or completion, or an attainment of purpose: the end of a day, of a race; to some good end.Close often implies a planned rounding off of something in process: the close of a conference.Conclusion suggests a decision or arrangement: All evidence leads to this conclusion; the conclusion of peace terms.Finish emphasizes completion of something begun: a fight to the finish.Outcome suggests the issue of something that was in doubt: the outcome of a game.7. See aim.

Original sense of "outermost part" is obsolete except in phrase ends of the earth. Sense of "destruction, death" was in Old English. Meaning "division or quarter of a town" was in Old English. The end "the last straw, the limit" (in a disparaging sense) is from 1929.

The phrase end run is first attested 1902 in U.S. football; extended to military tactics in World War II; general figurative sense is from 1968. End time in reference to the end of the world is from 1917. To end it all "commit suicide" is attested by 1911. Be-all and end-all is from Shakespeare ("Macbeth" I.vii.5).

Worldly wealth he cared not for, desiring onely to make both ends meet. [Thomas Fuller, "The History of the Worthies of England," 1662]

v.

Old English endian, from the source of end (n.). Related: Ended; ending.